It Could Happen To You
by S. Winter-Fitzgerald
Summary: Laszlo x Mary (because doesn't have her in the list of characters). It contains spoilers for Ep.8, "Psychopathia Sexualis", being set after it. Given this, there isn't much that can be said here without betraying said spoilers.


It Could Happen to You

Rationally, he knows all the terms, he can see the most likely path his feelings may take as clearly as if he had a map. He knows a hundred ways he might have grieved or will grieve. He knows that there are many configurations it can assume and many ways to cope. Rationally, he knows, but rationality means nothing when it happens to you. When it's your loved one who you find dead at the bottom of the stairs, when it's your loved one that has died because they were trying to protect you even if you were not home, when it's your loved one who has been killed in a fight with an unscrupulous man and something as ordinary as a bannister didn't hold up its end of the bargain.

For many years, Laszlo had thought he was above love. Well, not so much above it, more like he was unworthy of it. He could accept friendship and respect, partake in it even, but not love, and certainly not romantic love.

He had always had Mary in high regard. He respected her and cared for her, yet it happened with the detachment of someone who had long ago resigned himself to the realisation that he was probably as unfeeling as his withered arm.

Laszlo had noticed some particular attentions she paid him, but he couldn't place them in the specific scheme of their dynamic and that discomfited him. Watching Mary be brusque towards Sara did as well.

Everybody loved John. Laszlo knew it, accepted it and, now and then, envied it, in spite of having had made peace with the fact that people would never be drawn to him like they were to John. But he had never felt scared of his friend's gentleness and amiable personality until that afternoon when Mary and John had returned from Edison's Cinematograph, amused and having clearly enjoyed themselves.

Laszlo had been even more surprised by his reaction than the shocked Mary and John, lashing out prompted by what he recognised later as fear of the possibility that her affections might be placed upon his friend and not him. Why would he care about whom Mary placed her feelings on, he had wondered at first, but the prospect of there being someone else than him saddened him immensely. He had been baffled by this conclusion but once he had been able to process it, this new fact unlocked the meaning of all those times he had felt puzzled by the push and pull of their close interactions as of late. He was in love with Mary. The idea had been enough to leave him breathless and saying it out loud seemed unimaginable. If anything, it would have been Sara he might be inclined towards, as he had thought of sometimes, not Mary. Mary. Her presence an organic part of his life and household for so long. What had changed? How had it changed? Laszlo couldn't say exactly but the more he thought about it, surer he felt in his conclusion: he was in love with her. Both strange and heart-warming in itself, it could hardly compare with knowing that Mary loved him too. If felt thrilling and overwhelming. He might foster the pragmatic view of love he had told John, but whatever it was and however he worded it, nothing could match the actual feeling. Mary - stoic, devoted, smart, lovely Mary. Hers had been the face he had feared he would never see again as the carriage had been overthrown into the river. When it was finally set that he would live, he had felt renewed and ready to take the investigation even more seriously and to ask her to marry him. They would be happy, so happy it was almost heart-stopping.

It had happened to him. His heart had stopped but for other reasons. Not literally, but for some agonising minutes it had felt like it.

How could it have happened? Why had Mary had to die that afternoon like that instead of old age surrounded by their family many years from there?

His grief had smothered him and felt so powerful as if he was the only person caught in its way. It turns out that once you feel love, you feel loss as acutely; the price to pay for daring to be open to the world. Mary was more than a vessel for his self-discovery, he would have gladly remained in the dark if it had meant that she would live.

John, Cyrus, and Stevie had shown their support that afternoon as the coroner came and took Mary away, and later as he locked himself in his study because, while he knew they were suffering too, he felt close to exploding and keeping everybody and everything at bay was the only thing he could do.

Laszlo has been in a daze. An unfamiliar daze he wishes he could refuse but which he knows he has to face and acknowledge. It won't bring Mary back but maybe in time it will bring some of him.

* * *

A/n: In spite of having felt like writing something soon after this episode many weeks ago (why did Mary have to die?), things got in the way and I've only been able to finish writing it and posting it now, so I hope my memory and my search skills haven't let me me down to much and this is faithful to what happened in the show.

I hope you enjoy my foray into fic for this show and feedback is appreciated as always.

Thank you for your time.


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